There was a bit of confusion with this CD. Unless it disappeared in a puff of smoke (which I admit they sometimes do) there was no accompanying press blurb with this and I was left with a puzzle. This was due to the fact that I could not decipher the artist’s logo at all, the myspace address on the front of this came up as cancelled and there were not even any track titles. Luckily the persons name Malek Arthas Hijazi also on the front of the CD was unique enough for Google to come up trumps with the correct Myspace, which had the details and track names necessary to prevent this ending up on the reject pile. Just as well too as on the whole this is pretty good stuff.
Malek started off Infernal Scourge (and would be advised to perhaps approach Christophe Szpajdel for a new logo) back in 2004 when he was in the USA, now in Bahrain he unsurprisingly has very little support which is another reason I wanted to give this some attention. Opener ‘Secret Sinful Love (Lucifer’s Whore)’ weighs in at 16 minutes. The intro really reminds of an Italian horror film and I think (although not having time to sit and check) specifically Mariano Biano’s fantastic Dark Waters 1993. As we progress vocals gurgle in really sounding nasty like blood and razorblades are being gurgled and the instrumentation has an involving neo-classical slant. Influences by Beethoven, Vivaldi and Mozart shine through here and if anything this reminds a bit of Russian artist Mirrorthrone. Considering the length of the number this is well constructed and does not get boring as it evolves. Production is competent although recorded with things pushed up in the mix this distorts if played too loud. Atmosphere is top notch this really does convey a sense of dread and foreboding and having come back to this track a fair few times it shows one hell of a lot of promise to an artist ‘actively looking’ for a record label. In fact knowing their output www.blackmetal.com would be my first stop to approach with this demo material.
The keyboards on second number ‘The Wrath Of God And The Grace Of Babalon’ (sic) again really remind me of another horror film I can’t quite put my finger on (it’s very Claudio Simonetti) and there are nods towards other 1 man greats such as Burzum and Xasthur in the folds of this also epic track (20 minutes this one), pushing it above average in my opinion. The funereal mourn of instrumental ‘The Frozen 25th Hour’ is also a chilling and dreamy work of scope and this would be a very good demo if it stopped there.
Unfortunately intentions are somewhat ruined with ‘Ronda Alla Turca’ a cringe-worthy Mozart composition (yes you can wank a guitar but do we really want to hear it) and a substandard last number that simply sounds immature in the vocals and non-cohesive musically and could also have been happily left off this already very long overview of the artists work. That aside check this out at the following location;
www.myspace.com/infernalfolklore
